Column by Douglas Herman.
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“This is the true joy in life – being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one: being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.” ~ George...

Column by Paul Bonneau.
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There is an amusing “meme” floating around that bears on recent events:
I have found an article that is more even handed than most these days, on the question of Russian hacking of email servers. Highly recommended.
There are apparently, three distinct views that one can have of this controversy:
1) Whoever hacked the DNC email server--...

Column by Alex R. Knight III.
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There’s been a lot of talk for quite some time now about police brutality, misconduct, and unaccountability. In fact, last year saw an unprecedented level of demonstrations, riots -- and even multiple shootings of police – in response to cop actions against the populace deemed to be abusive and outside of written code, often with...

Column by Douglas Herman.
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“A lie can travel half way around the world while truth is still putting on its shoes.” ~ Mark Twain
I write for those so-called “fake news” websites. You know the ones: the 200 odd deplorable websites, the ones Hillary, the Pope and Michael Moore have attacked as threatening to destroy World Peace, Democracy, Facebook and...

Column by Paul Bonneau.
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For the younger readers, Wikipedia notes that “﻿Goldberg is best known for a series of popular cartoons depicting complicated gadgets that perform simple tasks in indirect, convoluted ways.”
Democracy
The first stage of our Rube Goldbergian government is Democracy. Mencken said it best: "Democracy is grounded upon so childish a...

Column by Douglas Herman.
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“Why are we in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such desperate measures?” ~ Henry David Thoreau
So I had to meet Miss America again. If someone said to me, 50 years ago when I was a tongue-tied teenager, that one day I’d be hanging out with a former beauty queen for a couple of days, trying not to fall in love with her as...

Column by Terry Hulsey.
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“I” comes from the flesh, but [...] “we” comes from the Devil. ~ Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
So much of life is compromise. Rare is the one who maintains his integrity to the end of his life. In this national election year when not one candidate stands for a consistent set of principles, it’s good to ask the question:...

Column by Paul Hein.
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Our trash is picked up on Tuesdays. Well, I should not simply say “trash,” because only one of the containers holds officially defined trash. The others are for recyclables and yard waste. (Ah, the carefree days of my youth, when trash was trash, and not analyzed and segregated.)
Recently, while writing out the check for these services, which are...

Column by Paul Bonneau.
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An alternative news site, Breitbart, had an interesting post today about comments Angela Merkel had made. It’s rare to see such a frank admission of what the ruling class is about:
﻿"Digitisation is a disruptive technological force that brings about deep-seated change and transformation in society. Look at the history of the printing press...

Column by Paul Hein.
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There doesn’t seem to be any debate about the fact that things are seriously wrong in America. The octogenarians among us--present writer included--can recall a vastly different America, with no “checkpoints” or rioting, or SWAT teams, or invasions of foreign countries which had not—and could not--attack us.
But why has this happened...

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One of the nice things about not voting is that one can enjoy a little sport at the expense of those who do. Let me share with you an example or three.
A few days before November 4th, I visited a nearby town, and first called at the government postal monopoly for some stamps so that I could write to an innocent friend incarcerated in a government prison. Standing in line, I said...

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February 4, 2009
'Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India , history will look upon the Act of depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.'
~ Mohandas Gandhi, from An Autobiography

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June 10, 2009
'The people have always some champion whom they set over them and nurse into greatness. This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector.'
~ Plato
'Wherever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to ensure implicit obedience is to...

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May 18, 2009
Dear Ron Paul Supporters,
Thank you. Thank you for giving your time, effort, and money to the cause of liberty. Thank you for taking a stand for what you know is right, and putting yourselves out there in favor of opinions the State would rather you didn't hold.

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May 18, 2009
Then Saul dressed David in his own tunic. He put a coat of armor on him and a bronze helmet on his head. David fastened on his sword over the tunic and tried walking around, because he was not used to them.

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As a former Orthodox Objectivist who now recognizes anarchy's intrinsic coherence, I have particular interest in studying the ethical basis of anarchism. Roy A. Childs, Jr.'s "Objectivism and the State: An Open Letter to Ayn Rand" and "The Epistemological Basis of Anarchism: An Open Letter to Objectivists and Libertarians," and Nicholas Dykes' "Mrs....

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May 14, 2009
The title of this article comes from 1 Corinthians 13:8. I can't call myself a believer anymore, but I do believe quite strongly in the need for each of us to be charitable. I think it's good for us. I know that for me, it helps to remind me of things I tend to forget, when I think of what it is that I lack. There are plenty of people worse off than I am, or...

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June 4, 2009
Part II: Rights are'
So what are rights? If there are none of these things, functionally, despite what anyone might claim, then what are they? How do they function in daily life? How are they exercised inalienably by every person everywhere that has ever existed, regardless of the government that claimed authority over them?
George Potter wrote:

Column by D. Saul Weiner.
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There are a lot of heated exchanges going on right now in social media related to vaccination. Many people have become convinced that parents who do not vaccinate are jeopardizing the health of others and that vaccines for children should be mandated. Politicians who are expected to run for president in 2016 are starting to weigh in on the topic and some...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Introduction for this 2013 Edition
As I write this – October 28, 2013, more than four years after the column below was posted (here with minor edits; see the original at this link if you wish) – NBC News is reporting that the Obama administration “knew millions could not keep their health insurance" under Obamacare, and has known...

Column by Alex R. Knight III.
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Perhaps never before have I encountered a proposal within Liberty Movement circles that has generated more controversy faster and further than Adam Kokesh’s planned July 4th march on Washington, District of Criminals, in which he states that himself and the other participants “will march with rifles loaded & slung across our backs to...

Column by Faisal Moghul.
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Almost 30 years ago, cultural critic Neil Postman argued in Amusing Ourselves to Death that television’s gradual replacement of the printing press has created a dumbed-down culture driven by mindless entertainment. In this context, Postman claimed that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World correctly foresaw our dystopian future, as opposed to George...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Perhaps I should say this paradigm shift is resuming. The healthier incoming paradigm is a modern, more accurate, better-supported, and better-understood version of one that began the shift towards a free, healthy, and prosperous world more than three centuries ago and which informed the creation of the United States itself: Classical Liberalism.
- 1...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Part 3 of "Could the Non-Aggression Principle Stop the Sixth Great Extinction?"
Part One of this series discussed the Non-Aggression principle, calling it "the libertarian half of the Golden Rule" (compassion being the other half) and describing the function of aggression in creating not only tyranny and war but also...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Question: are you more terrified by Muslim extremists, by "domestic terrorists" – or by your own government? Which group is more likely to assault you? To kill you? To unjustly imprison and even torture you?
The U.S. federal government has ALREADY:
Built and is staffing a huge gulag of concentration camps [...

Column by JGVibes.
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Although the common perception of human nature is very negative, the truth is that most people who aren’t mentally ill have a very difficult time committing acts of violence. Usually it takes a sizeable payment and a fair amount of manipulation to convince someone to act violently, and even then a tremendous amount of guilt typically...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Plundering Wealth vs Producing Wealth
In recent decades, the rich have gathered an increasing share of the total wealth in the United States. As this wealth disparity grows and especially as large numbers of the formerly middle class fall into poverty and even into homelessness, this flow of wealth from main street (from anyone not...

Column by Glen Allport.
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This is Part 2 of a response to a column by Wesley Messamore. Last week's Part One of this column discussed the following:
· Minarchy: Lighting a Match to the Fuse of Tyranny
· Anarchy: By Itself, Yang without Yin
· The Missing Key...

Column by Scott Lazarowitz.
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Regarding the traditional left-right scheme and modern uses of the terms “conservative” and “liberal,” the neoconservatives are hardly conservative and the liberals and progressives are hardly liberal or progressive. Rather than viewing “left” as liberal or progressive, and “right” as conservative or...

Column by new Root Striker David Calderwood.
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It’s Political Season and the airwaves are stuffed with Great Plans from Great Men, full of promises to Fix This and Fix That. I guess the goal is, “He who makes the Most Believable Promises Wins.”
Bah.
Does anyone else share my sense that I’m a passenger on a stagecoach that is being...

Column by Alex R. Knight III
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One of the good folks at Gun Owners of Vermont (I like spelling that out much more than the acronym – GOVT – for what should be an obvious reason) recently sent me, along with my 2012 membership card, a piece published not long ago in a small freebie newspaper called The Shopper. It hails out of Ludlow, Vermont, and the...

Column by Scott Lazarowitz.
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Many of today’s conservatives speak of traditional moral values and free-market capitalism, and say they are “against collectivism, socialism and communism.” But an examination of the actual policies they support and the way they want to implement their “values” shows that many conservatives are really the collectivist,...

Column by tzo.
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The specter of the heartless libertarian arises when it is suggested that society could perhaps be better organized without a coercive government at its core. The proponents of this shocking scheme are dismissed as being either blatantly naïve or else accused of being calculating, soulless monsters who don’t want to be bothered with the less...

Column by R.K. Blacksher.
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In an 1877 essay titled “Against Women’s Suffrage,” Lysander Spooner wrote, “Women are human beings, and consequently have all the natural rights that any human being can have.” These natural rights, Spooner argued, do not include the “right” to use the power of the state to engage in theft and coercion against...

Column by tzo.
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Part II: Get Real
Reality check: There is little I can do to change society as it is currently configured, and the Constitutionalist must come to grips with the fact that he is in an identical situation. The Voluntaryist is ridiculed for holding a position that hardly anyone understands or is aligned with, but the same may be said of the Ron Paul...

Column by Lawrence M. Ludlow.
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In February, Sky Conway introduced Libertopia to the anarchists who gather regularly at Café Libertalia in San Diego. I decided to interview him again to explore his concept for the Libertopia weekend (October 21 to 23) a bit further. I gave up on writing a formal interview article, but the following paraphrase is an accurate depiction of what...

Column by Glen Allport.
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Hello Wesley,
I loved your Libertarian Dilemma: Anarchy or Minarchy? in today’s Humble Libertarian (March 22, 2011). Since founding the site, you’ve shown a knack for asking interesting questions and a willingness to consider views outside your comfort zone. In this new column, you say, among other things, that “I am...

Column by Glen Allport.
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In plain language, there is no good reason for the unfolding Social Security nightmare. Yes, the Baby Boomers are retiring, but so what? It's a big group, but this same big group has been paying into Social Security their whole adult lives. It's not like the money hasn't been set aside or anything.
Right?
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Of course,...